


these inconvenient fireworks

by temporaryforce



Category: Grayscale
Genre: Fluff, M/M, PWP
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-20
Updated: 2015-10-20
Packaged: 2018-04-27 06:15:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5037043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporaryforce/pseuds/temporaryforce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Nine starts talking. His voice is low. “I like it at night,” he says, “y’ can get away with all kinds of shit at night.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Dice releases a long breath. “Do you make a habit of getting away with shit at night?” he says.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Nine laughs. He takes Dice’s hand and threads their fingers together. He doesn’t answer the question. “Look,” he says instead, pointing up with his other hand. “check it out. Lyra: right above us.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Dice squints. “I don’t know what you’re pointing at,” he says.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Look — those six stars? The ones that look kinda like a fish if you connect the dots. It’s actually Lyra — the lyre. An instrument.”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“I don’t see shit,” Dice says. “Also, I know what a lyre is.”</em>
</p><p>Or: Stargazing and chill.</p>
            </blockquote>





	these inconvenient fireworks

**Author's Note:**

> You know what you gotta do when you're desperate for fic in a particular fandom? Write it yourself. GUILTY AS CHARGED.
> 
> Title from Vienna Teng's "Stray Italian Greyhound".

It’s a clear night. The sky is an inverted bowl, studded richly with stars, and Dice feels something tug in his gut when he looks up. He thinks, _I haven’t felt this free in a long time._ He thinks, _I haven’t been this free before._

Nine sidles up next to him, slips a companionable arm around his shoulders. Dice leans into it unabashedly. “Look at all these damn stars,” he says.

“Look at ’em,” Nine agrees. His arm tightens around Dice, warm and snug against his side. Something struggles to expand in Dice, a tight wavering feeling in the pit of his stomach, like long-fuse firecrackers. “It feels like I haven’t noticed the stars for real since we left — the labs.”

Dice hums quietly, afraid his own words will break the moment. It hasn’t been long since he and Nine have been — _this way; _and he’s still afraid he’s going to ruin it, say something wrong and then have to watch Nine close off, turn into a blank wall.__

Nine is silent for a long stretch. Then: “Do you still regret it?”

Dice fights not to tense. He pushes his face into Nine’s shoulder, instead, and breathes him in. He’s allowed this, isn’t he? After everything? “— No,” he says. “No, I don’t.”

“Took you a minute,” Nine observes. It’s not accusatory.

“I mean it,” Dice says. He’s firm, almost sharp. “I mean it.”

“I believe you.”

They stay as they are, clinging like raindrops and not talking about it.

“Let’s lie down,” Nine says, abruptly.

Dice startles. “Huh?”

“Haven’t you ever gone stargazing before? If I keep looking up like this I’ll get a crick in my neck.”

“Now you know how I feel looking at you,” Dice mutters; then blushes, thankful for the cover of darkness. Nine just withdraws his arm and elbows him before flopping down on his back. Dice joins him.

The silence is awkward this time. Tense, like a rubber band wavering between releasing or breaking. Dice feels those firecrackers climb, up his esophagus, turning into clamoring words fighting to escape —

Nine starts talking. His voice is low. “I like it at night,” he says, “y’ can get away with all kinds of shit at night.”

Dice releases a long breath. “Do you make a habit of getting away with shit at night?” he says.

Nine laughs. He takes Dice’s hand and threads their fingers together. He doesn’t answer the question. “Look,” he says instead, pointing up with his other hand. “check it out. Lyra: right above us.”

Dice squints. “I don’t know what you’re pointing at,” he says.

“Look — those six stars? The ones that look kinda like a fish if you connect the dots. It’s actually Lyra — the lyre. An instrument.”

“I don’t see shit,” Dice says. “Also, I know what a lyre is.”

“Okay,” Nine says, “calm down, genius. Did you know who created it?”

“What, the stars? I didn’t take you for the religious type.”

“The _lyre._ It was Hermes,” Nine says. “Dude with the flying shoes.”

“I know. The Greeks came up with him, right?”

“You know much about human mythology?”

“Not much. I always figured Hermes was actually just a phoenix, though.”

“You _would._ ” It’s fond.

“I always thought whoever came up with these constellations must have lost their damn marbles,” Dice admits. “Either that, or they’re seeing something I can’t see for the life of me.”

“Have I lost my damn marbles too, then?” Nine asks, amused. He turns his head. Dice turns to face him. Nine’s thumb is stroking the back of Dice’s hand, gently. It makes Dice feel as though his hair is standing on end.

“I thought,” he says, a mite breathless, “I thought that was already a given.” Dice can tell Nine is looking at him. His eyes have adjusted to the darkness, now, and he can dimly make out Nine’s features, just a few inches away.

Nine reaches over and puts a hand on the side of Dice’s neck. He looks intent and faraway, like he can see something Dice can’t.

“Maybe,” he says. “Maybe it is.” His hand strokes Dice’s neck a little. Dice’s gaze zeroes in on Nine’s mouth, a soft smudge in the faint starlight, and he feels Nine’s touch with a sudden intense clarity that makes him blush again, harder. “Around you, it definitely is. For sure.”

The firecrackers are back down low in Dice’s stomach, roiling as he leans forward. Nine responds in kind, squeezing Dice’s hand, simple, easy.

Nine kisses Dice slow and sweet, hand coming up from his neck to cup his cheek. His fingers tangle in the stray hairs tumbling down from Dice’s forehead. It’s almost dreamlike. Dice feels hot and shivery, like there are stars in his veins, burning bright. He kisses back, helplessly entranced, and his blood seems to spark at the shallow sweep of Nine’s tongue into his mouth, at the scrape of stubble against his skin. He arches towards Nine, body liquid and magnetized.

Nine shifts closer, still intent on kissing Dice. Their bodies slot easily as ever; and Dice melts in the simple warmth of their chests pressed together, Nine’s leg pressed between his. It is so good, so simple, so lovely. He could, he thinks, do this forever.

When Nine pulls away, Dice is fairly gasping. “Guess you’re right,” Nine says.

Dice is about to ask what exactly he’s right about — though he has no doubt in his mind that he is, in fact, right — and then Nine noses at the underside of his jaw and his thoughts scatter like so much dust in the wind. “Yeah,” Dice says, “yes. Hey, Nine, come on —”

At Dice’s encouragement, Nine rolls on top of Dice, presses him down, kisses his neck. It is electric. It is all of a sudden and nearly too much. Dice wraps his arms around Nine and digs his nails into Nine’s back and moans. The hot ache in his blood has become a common sensation over the past weeks; yet it feels new every time it surges up — every time Nine makes it surge up.

That ache is building now, sweet and familiar. Dice spreads his legs a little and arches up against Nine, moaning again at the warm pressure against his dick.

“God, you’re pretty,” Nine says at that, voice ragged around the edges. Dice almost snorts. He really, truly would have; had he not been too busy rolling his hips, grinding up against Nine and biting back his continuing gasps.

He does manage: “You — have you — seen _yourself?_ ” which is, perhaps, not the wisest choice of response; because Nine just smirks — well, it’s too dark and Nine is too close to tell for sure, but Dice knows well enough exactly what brand of asshole Nine is to know that he is smirking.

“You can’t even see _me,_ ” Dice continues, inanely. Nine is very solid and he is basically a furnace and he is definitely responding positively to the hip-rolling, which is distracting.

“I can feel you,” Nine says quietly, and reaches down to palm at Dice’s dick through the soft material of his trousers.

Dice shuts his eyes. “ _God,_ ” he gasps, any further attempts at articulateness summarily dismissed. He has priorities, after all. He is stripped down to three words, _god_ and _Nine_ and _please,_ and he chokes them out in various orders as Nine first strokes him firm and sure, then removes his hand and presses his hips down again.

“ _Dice,_ ” Nine says, and kisses the top of his head, strangely tender. It’s an odd position; their hips align as they rock together, but Nine is tall enough that all Dice can do is cling to his shoulders, bury his face in his chest and moan.

Dice can feel the sweetness building in him, and it’s almost excruciating: Nine is so close to him, so close; it’s as though every inch of their skin is pressed together; but Dice needs something more, he needs —

Nine stills, then raises himself up a little. Dice looks up at him, feels Nine’s fingers thread through his hair again. “Come on,” Nine says, and his voice is ragged-edged. He presses his other hand down again on Dice’s cock. Dice is aching, so hard he can barely focus his eyes. “Come on, come for me.”

Dice obliges, shaking and clinging through it, too far gone for embarrassment. He’s dimly aware that Nine is coming, too, as they shudder together, moment bleeding into moment until Dice can hardly stand it.

It’s over, then, of course; and Dice reaches up and runs his own fingers through Nine’s hair, stroking him like a cat. Nine smiles at him.

“You good?” he asks.

“I’m,” Dice says, and then, “yes,” and Nine laughs.

The sky hasn’t changed. Somehow Dice feels as though it must have cracked, must have crumpled as he and Nine lay there kissing and touching one another; but it lies up high still, serene and velvety. “I’m glad,” Dice says impulsively.

“Me fuckin’ too,” Nine says instantly, and then, “— For what?”

“That we,” Dice says. “You know. And that you’ve got no marbles.”

Nine laughs again. “That’s what you were right about, you know,” he says. “Running off with you. _Stargazing_ with the likes of you. Though you’ve got more romance in your soul than I gave ya credit for, you know?”

“ _Romance in my soul?_ ” Dice says, aiming for scornful and landing on embarrassed. He reaches up and plants a quick kiss on Nine’s obnoxious, grinning mouth, just to spite him.

“There you are,” Nine says warmly. “Do that more. Do that always.”

“Okay,” Dice says. “Okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to [Erin](http://snuggaboo.tumblr.com) for the constant encouragement and speedy beta. I think it's safe to say you can expect more in this fandom from the both of us. We have 22 pages of 10-pt font on a doc SOLELY devoted to these ridiculous dudes, okay. IT'S GONNA HAPPEN.
> 
> You can find me [here](http://peridexis.tumblr.com) on tumblr. Please do comment if you'd like! I'd ask for serious feedback, but let's be real, this is self-indulgent bullshit. WHOOPS.


End file.
